The midget AAA St. Albert Cardinals finished off their run at provincials with a win at Legion Memorial Park, just not in the tournament final.
The last game of the year was Saturday’s 13-9 decision against the Calgary Cubs, which evened the Red Birds tournament record at 2-2. For third-year midget players like Shane Zimmer, Taylor Simmonds, Jeremy Blazuk, McLean Cruthers, Levi Dick and Scott Peterson it was a great way to finish off their Cardinals’ careers.
“I feel like we ended the season off on a good note,” said Blazuk, 17, who played third base for the Cardinals in his final game. “We struggled for a while, but in these last two games we came together.”
Meanwhile for Zimmer, who has played in the infield, outfield and pitched in the Cardinals’ system, it won’t be long until he is back in the swing of things. The 18-year-old will be joining Canisius College in Buffalo, N.Y. The NCAA division one team practices and plays intersquad games during the fall and the season starts in the spring.
“When the summer started I wasn’t really thinking about Buffalo, but now that this is done and summer is wrapping up it’s getting closer and closer I’m getting excited day by day,” Zimmer said.
The game against Calgary completed the tournament’s round robin schedule. Because SEEBA 1 and the Red Deer Braves, both in pool A with St. Albert, went 3-1, the Cardinals knew that even with a win over Calgary they would fail to advance into Sunday’s semifinals. In the final, SEEBA 1 defeated Red Deer 4-1 and will represent Alberta at the national championship tournament in London, Ont. later this month. SEEBA 1 lost only three games out of 40 in the regular season and provincials.
Dick, St. Albert’s starting pitcher against Calgary, gave up two runs in the first inning, but the Cardinals came back strong in their half of the opening inning by putting seven runs on the board.
Simmonds and Blazuk opened things up with line-drive singles to the outfield. Zimmer then hit a two-run double to the left field fence. After Cruthers fouled out, Peterson hit an RBI triple and was later knocked in with an RBI single from designated hitter Kyle Gonzales.
Dick pitched for four innings, before making way for Jordan Denault, who threw for the rest of the game.
Calgary held a 9-8 lead briefly in the fourth inning, but the Cardinals quickly tied things up and went ahead in the next inning.
The Cardinals opened the tournament with a five-inning 14-2 mercy-rule loss to SEEBA 1 Thursday. On Friday they lost 4-1 to Okotoks Red and Saturday beat Red Deer 7-5.
St. Albert manager Kurtis Lay, when reflecting on the tournament and considering how things could have been different, quickly recalled the fifth inning of the loss to SEEBA 1, when the Cardinals gave up 12 runs.
“We had a situation to get us to two outs with nobody on and we weren’t able to stop the bleeding,” he said. “Throughout the year, we really didn’t do a good job of stopping things whenever they started rolling downhill and it got us this weekend.”
Lay will soon return to the southern United States where he will coach the baseball team at Cochise College, a junior college in Douglas, Ariz.
“Everything hasn’t been great this year, but they [the parents] have always been supportive. They’ve always stuck with me and they’ve stuck with the team. I hope it was a good experience for everybody. I know, personally, it was a good experience for me,” said Lay, who thanked Mike Denault and his family for taking him into his home, as well as the St. Albert Minor Baseball Association for the opportunity to coach the Cardinals.
